Prof. Scott B. NoegelChair, Dept. of Near Eastern Languages and CivilizationUniversity of Washington

"AnAsymmmetricalJanus Parallelism in the Gilgamesh Flood Story."

First Published in:Acta Sumerologica 16 (1994), 306-308.

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An Asymmetrical Janus Parallelism in the Gilgamesh Flood Story 1

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In a previous issue of this journal2 I gave evidence for a type of polysemy inGilgamesh XI which acts to parallel both that which precedes and that which follows.The device, until then known only from the Bible as "Janus Parallelism,'. was notedin XI: 25-27.

25. mussir mesre se napsiitiAbandon wealth! Seek life!

26. makkura zerma napista bulli(

. Spurn property! (Construct a boat!) Keep living beings alive!27. (SJulima zer napsati kalama ana libbi gBelippi

Make all living beings go up into the boat!

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An Asymmetrical Janus Parallelism 307

As "Spurn property!,"3 line 26 connects with line"Construct a boat!,"5 the sentence alludes to the analine.

A related use of polysemy occurs in Gilg XI: f4.14. sakiin ababi ub/a libbiiSunu iliinf rabuti

. the great gods determined to bring about the

25, "Abandon wealth!".4 As

libbi gi~elippi in the following

deluge.6

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Here ub/a means either "to want, desire, yearn for, to determine," in which case itanticipates libbiisunu,7 or "to carry off, sweep away (said of water),',g in which caseit relates back to ababi.9 That both readings are acceptable by context suggests thatboth were intended. Unlike the polysemy in XI:25-27, this example, also known fromthe Bible, is of the asymmetrical type, i.e., it is not accomplished in three stichs.lO

As noted by Anne Draffk.orn Kilmer,ll similar word manipulation is common and

quite meaningful in the Gilgamesh epic and is often accompanied by clues giyen bythe characters in the story. Accordingly, one wonders if such subtleties are alluded to

in XI:9-10 by Uta-napiStim when he proclaims /upteka dGilgame! amat ni$irti u pirlStasa iliini kasa /uqbfka "'I will reyeal to you, Gilgamesh, a thing that is hidden, a secretof the gods I will tell you! ,"

Notes

1. I would like to thank Prof. Dayid I. Owen for his helpful comments on thisnote.

2. Scott Noegel, "A Janus Parallelism in the Gilgamesh Flood Story," AS] 13(1991), 419-421.

3. CAD Z 98, S.Y.zeru; CAD M/1 133-136, S.Y. makkaru.4. CAD ~ 349, S.Y.e:jeru.

5. For ma(k)kuru as "boat" see H. A. Hoffner, "Enki's Command to Atrabasis,"in B. L. Eichler, et al., Kramer Anniversary Volume (AOAT 25) (Verlag Butzon &Bercker Keyelaer Neukirchener Verlag Neukirchen- Vluyn, 1976), p. 244.

6. So CAD A/I 21-22, s.Y. abii/u.

7. libbu frequently occurs as the subject of abii/u. See CAD A/I 21, s.Y. abii/u.8. CAD, A/I 16-17, s.Y. abii/u. Note also that the verb occurs in Xl:241: "let

him wash, throwaway his pelts, let the sea carry (them) away" (Ubil tamm). For thissee CAD A/I 16b, s.Y. abii/u.

9. Note that sakiinu also can mean "to inflict loss or calamity," CAD S/1 129,130, 155, S.Y. sakiinu.

10. For biblical examples see C. H. Gordon, "Asymmetric Janus Parallelism,"

'-/ 308 Kent Hillard

Eretz Israel, (Harry M. Orlinsky Volume), v.16, 80* and 'This Time' (Genesis 2:23),"in "Sha'arei Talmon: Studies in the Bible. Qumran, and the Ancient Near East Pre-

sented to Shemaryahu Talmon (Winona Lake, IN.: Eisenbrauns, 1992), pp. 50-51.11.Anne Draffkorn Kilmer, "A Note on an Overlooked Word-Play in the

Akkadian Gilgamesh," in Zikir Sumim: Assyriological Studies Presented to F. R. Kraus

on the Occasion of His Seventieth Birthday; G. Van Driel, Th. J. H. Krispijn, M. Stol,K R. Veenhof, eds. (Leiden: E. J. Brill, 1982), pp. 128-132; "Les jeux de mots dansles reves de Gilgamesh et d' Atrahasis," Paper read at the Universaire des SciencesHumaines, Strasbourg, 1983 (courtesy of Prof. Kilmer), pp. 1-7; "The Symbolism ofthe Flies in the Mesopotamian Flood Myth and Some Further Implications," inFrancesca Rochberg-Halton, ed. Language, Literature, and History: Philological andHistorical Studies Presented to Erica Reiner (New Haven, CT: American Oriental

Society, 1987), pp. 175-180:

~ Scott B. NoegelCornell University

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Corrections and Additions to "Collations to the Rosicrucian and

Stanford University Texts in SET' (AS] 15)

Subsequent to the publication of collations of the Rosicrucian and Stanford Ur

III texts, done by John Carnahan (who also copied certain seal impressions) andmyself, I noticed several errors. I hope here to correct at least most of the errors. Myapologies for any inconvenience they may have caused.

R. Englund had reconstructed the portions of SET 130 dealing with fats, and had

come up with a few lines that differed slightly from my own. This prompted me torecheck the figures against the tablet, resulting in some slightly revised readings.

In addition to thanking R. Englund and those people mentioned in the introductionto the collations in AS] 15, I would like to thank H. Waetzoldt, who offered a

suggestion about the seal impression of SET 19, and J. Carnahan for checking hiscollation notes and supplying the correction to SET 274 i 14.

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